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Accessibility with ASOSU

Meet Dakota Train, a third-year student at OSU, and now the Director of Accessibility Affairs at ASOSU.

After working as an intern with the previous director, Jonathan Goatcher, Train applied for the position himself. Now he is using his experiences and the experiences of those closest to him for inspiration.

While physical access is always an important issue, Train is broadening his perspective. Rather than focusing strictly on physical barriers, one of his goals for this year is to help increase awareness of non-visible disabilities, something he has some experience with.

“All of my immediate family members have some form of invisible disability,” Train said.

But he’s not stopping there. For Train, making the university accessible means creating a campus where everyone can come and go safely, even at night.

“I want to improve the safety for students who feel uneasy walking on campus,” he said, and mentioned wanting to improve the walkway lighting on campus. He’s also working with campus partners to see about creating a call center for students to call and have someone talk to them and keep track of their route on the way home.

While he’s already got several projects to work on, he is still open to ideas.

“I don’t know the struggle of everyday with a disability,” he said. Train wants to hear what concerns students have, whether it’s difficulty with a faculty member or accessing a campus building or program.

“I have a lot of resources,” Train said, “I know who to talk to and can be that avenue.”